Be joyful in hope.
A few years ago, before lockdown prevented foreign travel, we took a cheap break to Bulgaria before I started my current job. We were staying in a nice resort just outside the town of Sozopol, south of Burgas, when we decided to visit the old town of Nesebar, not far from the notorious resort town of Sunny Beach, to the north of Burgas. There was one direct bus per day, we caught it and had a great day exploring the old town.
We knew the time the bus back to Sozopol was due and made sure we were back in good time to catch it. As we arrived, the bus station was busy with holidaymakers from all across Europe heading back to Sunny Beach, and a few locals returning to Burgas.
The time for our bus came. And then it went. No bus. We checked the timetable multiple times. It was clearly late.
Then that horrible feeling started to descend on us: what if it wasn't coming at all? Well, we could maybe head into Sunny Beach or Burgas and find onward transport to Sozopol, but what if there was none?
We were quite preoccupied with checking and rechecking websites, trying to find reliable information to make sure we could get back to our resort while other buses came, filled up with passengers, and then left.
Just as we were thinking that a taxi or a bus to Burgas sounded like the best option, an old fashioned coach wheezed its way into the bus station and sighed its way to a halt to let passengers off. We took a good look at it and immediately realised it was our bus. The company name was a good clue: Sozopolbus.
The world around us views hope a little like that. They believe what people say as if it was a bus timetable. They would like to believe it. But they know that innumerable things can go wrong and prevent it from happening. So hope for them is like longing for something good to happen, without having a scrap of evidence that it really will.
Actually, their version of hope is worse. It's like standing in a bus station waiting on a bus without any assurance that you are in the right place, or the right city, or even that there is such a thing as a bus.
That version of hope is really hope-less.
That is why these words make absolutely no sense at all to a secular person. How can anyone be joyful with that kind of a hope? How can you even be remotely happy? Such a notion is completely absurd.
This is why we have billions of pounds borrowed in personal debt. We borrow to have things because our hope of having them any other way is so small. That's why we have crime and violence and fraud and corporate corruption.
It's due to lack of hope.
This is what Paul says about hope elsewhere in Romans:
We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.
Romans 8:22-25 NIVUK
You see, often in life there is a gap between the things we have now, and the things we think we need to be happy. What fills this gap and keeps us going until we have what we think we need is hope. For example, I had a former colleague whose salary never seemed to be enough, but who dreamed of winning the lottery. His hope was in that lottery win.
This is where the world completely misunderstands hope. They see hope as a kind of vain optimism that something good is around the corner, even if there is no evidence of it - like my former colleague hoping for a lottery win.
But Christian hope is fundamentally different to this.
As Paul says elsewhere:
For no matter how many promises God has made, they are ‘Yes’ in Christ. And so through him the ‘Amen’ is spoken by us to the glory of God. Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.
2 Corinthians 1:20-22 NIVUK
So in case we feel like all hope is gone, and that our eternity seems thoroughly unlikely, we have the Holy Spirit as a 'down payment' on our future salvation.
But in case you think this is 'pie in the sky when you die', look at these words penned by King David:
The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
Psalms 23:1 NIVUK
Fear the Lord , you his holy people, for those who fear him lack nothing. The lions may grow weak and hungry, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.
Psalms 34:9-10 NIVUK
For a Christian whose hope is in the Lord, not only is there a glorious eternal future held safe for us (1 Peter 1:3-5), but we lack no good thing on earth because we have the Lord. Even when intimidated when surrounded by problems like Elisha's servant, we know that the One who is with us is greater than those who are against us (2 Kings 6:16).
What does this mean? For those whose hope is in the Lord, we are not intimidated by the future, because the future is secure. We are not afraid of the present, because the present is secure. And we are not afraid of the struggle, because we have the strength to endure:
Why do you complain, Jacob? Why do you say, Israel, ‘My way is hidden from the Lord ; my cause is disregarded by my God’? Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no-one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
Isaiah 40:27-31 NIVUK
Why do they renew their strength? Why can they run and not grow weary? Why can they walk and not grow faint?
Let me explain it using sport. Many of us are familiar with the concept of a league - a 'round robin' tournament where there is a group of teams and every team has to play each other. The way the world views hope is a bit like supporters of a team at the start of a season, where they hope their team will win the league, but they have no proof that they will.
Christian hope is different. You see, in a league, it's possible to be so far ahead of the competition that you cannot be caught, even though there are matches still to play. It is possible to be the winner but not have the medals and the trophy because the league has not ended yet.
The latter is what Christian hope is like. Christ has won the war for us. Because we are on His team, we are victorious. Because we hope in Him, when we take to the field of life and face our struggles, we do so with a smile on our face and a spring in our step because we are the victors. We have won. Nothing can take that away from us.
That is what it means to be joyful in hope. It means that we have good things from God right now. It means that we know He is working for our good right now, no matter what (Romans 8:28). It means that yes, we may not have everything we want and life may be hard, but the Lord is with us and working for us and going ahead of us to lead us to the final victory celebration.
That is joy in hope. That is not just 'pie in the sky when you die'. Or even 'steak on the plate while you wait'. That is more 'seven star hotel with three buffet meals today that don't ever make you obese with a promise of something even better than that to come'.
So, friend, are you hoping in God? Are you joyful in hope?
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